Title: Good Enough to Be Getting on WithAuthor: iulia_linneaPairings: Girl!Harry/Charlie, Girl!Harry Snarry, othersRating: PG-13Warning (highlight to view): For AU, mentions of past character death, and mild violence.Word Count: 8971Summary: This is the first story in the Verges and Variations Cycle, in which Snape and Harry work out the connection between themselves after a spell goes awry.Disclaimer: This piece is based on characters and situations created and owned by J.K. Rowling; various publishers, including, but not limited to: Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books, Raincoast Books; and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.Author's Notes: Because of my back-up snafu, I don't have the exact dates for this story. I do know, however, that it was completed and archived at Whole New Worlds by 30 September 2003. This is an unedited repost of the fic, which I still enjoy, warts and all. *g*

Prolegomenon

Stalking the corridors in the third month of the year
following Harry's transformation, Severus felt compelled to
inspect the halls near Gryffindor Tower. It was quiet there, save for
the whisper of a shadow that he thought was
Mrs. Norris, also on patrol. He decided to try the kitchens for
students in search of mischief, and, in lieu of
finding any, a cup of tea. He was walking away when it happened.

A shriek rent the air, and he turned to see three bodies come
tumbling out from behind the Fat Lady's portrait.
Severus drew back into the shadows out of instinct.

"Give a lady her dignity! Her beauty sleep! Some warning!"
yelled the subject of the painting, which remained
askew to afford a better view of the disturbance to its owner.

"It's all you worry about—Harry
this, and Harry that—I hate
you! I knew it!" Hermione Granger
screamed at the
top of her lungs, her hands full of bright red hair—some of
it still attached to its owner's head.

Ronald Weasley, for his part, was trying to disentangle
himself from the girl without harming either himself or
her, or allowing her to harm Harry, who was squashed between them.

"Please, Hermione, it's not
Ron's fault! I asked him to kiss me. He didn't want
to! Why would anyone want to?
I was just trying to figure it out. I swear!"

Severus thought that Miss Granger certainly had a facility for
inspiring fear, and he would have found the scene
comical had it not been for what he could perceive of Harry's
face. Tear-stained, though she was not crying
now, it held sincerity, terror . . . and angry looking red and purple
blotches. To his irritation, he found that he
could not take pleasure in the brat's predicament. He moved
to interfere, but paused as he felt a hand on his arm.
It was Minerva.

"Best let them sort it out for
themselves," she whispered in a tone that carried with it
both maternal anguish and
resolve.

"You're right, you
freak. No one would want to kiss you; you're the
Girl-Who-Lived-to-Steal-Everybody's-Boyfriend. If Ron
didn't pity you, he'd never—"

"That's the outside of enough,
Hermione!" that young man yelled, suddenly seizing Miss
Granger's wrists and
rolling hard on his right side to separate the two of them from Harry.
"You should be ashamed!"

"I should be ashamed? I
should be? She's the slut—visiting
boys in their rooms with nothing decent on!"

That, at least, was true, for Harry was wearing a short red
cotton nightgown—no slippers, no robe. Snape felt
uncomfortable having his attention drawn to so much of his
least-favorite student, especially as his least-favorite
student had become a preternaturally well-developed, charismatic young
woman. He tried not to follow this line
of thought, for he had always avoided fantasizing about the students.
Fantasizing about this student would
render his nights entirely too complicated . . . .

"I'll bet she liked you before
the Change!" Granger yelled, pulling free of Weasley and
standing up.

The boy flew up after her. "He—she—I—we—never—agh!"
He squeezed his hands into fists and pumped them at his
sides as if to anchor himself. "Look at her, damn
you," he demanded when at last he could speak coherently.
"Look at your friend."

Severus heard Minerva's swift intake of breath as
she apparently did what Mr. Weasley had ordered.

Harry had crumpled into a ball underneath a window, attempting
to shield herself from the other girl's gaze. Her
state of undress wasn't the issue; she was wearing more
bruises than most players sported after a Quidditch
match.

"You did that to her, Hermione. You
attacked her, not someone bad, and she didn't
defend herself. If we were
really doing something wrong, Harry wouldn't care what
you thought. She would have fought you."

Severus moved before Minerva could even react, sweeping toward
the girl and removing his cloak at the same
time. He knelt to cover Harry, and then drew her up into his arms to
cradle her inside of them. He was
perversely gratified when she did not pull away.

"That's all right, then. That's
all right. Do not favor the unworthy with the gift of your
tears," he whispered into
her short, disheveled hair, rocking the girl against himself in an
attempt to still her.

After a moment, when Harry began to realize in whose arms she
was, she lifted her head and attempted to
explain herself.

"That's all right, Harry. Truly,"
Severus assured her, pressing his lips to her scar for
emphasis—only to pull away
with a gasp as an arc of green-black energy pulsed between her mark . .
. and his own.

He was not permitted time to process the meaning of this
connection, for suddenly Minerva was there crooning
comforting nothings into Harry's ear as she lifted the girl
into a standing position. She made certain to keep the
cloak firmly wrapped around her young charge.

Harry's long, black, glossy hair was bound in a
braid that fell over her left shoulder and dropped past her
broomstick toward the earth. She was high over Hogwarts, leaning into
her handle and abstractedly making her
braid swing in little circles. Today, she'd begin temporarily
coaching the Gryffindor Quidditch team due to an
unfortunate incident involving Martin
Finch-Fletchley—Justin's younger
brother—Miranda Frazier—the first witch
to be born to a family of Squibbs in three generations—and
several pots of improperly bespelled, bobotuber-pus-augmented,
butterscotch pudding that had never been intended for the use to which
they had put it. Harry
giggled at the memory of finding the two Seventh Years underneath the
Quidditch bleachers almost done in by
pudding with a mind of its own, but her mirth soon faded. For today as
well, Harry would be presented as the
new Head of House Gryffindor.

A tear slid down her nose, dangled for a moment from its tip,
and then dropped imperceptibly to the ground far
below her.

Turning to face the school, Harry was surprised to see a dark
figure on an ancient FireThorn 200 gliding
purposefully, albeit uneasily, toward her in the increasing light of
the dawn.

"Professor Snape," greeted Harry.
"What brings you out so early?"

"You, actually, Professor—or should I say,
Coach—Potter?" he asked, with
only the barest hint of a smirk. Frazier
and Finch-Fletchley owed the continued functioning of certain of their
various parts to him, as he reminded
them daily during their separate detentions.

"Don't worry. I'm not planning
to sabotage the field before the Slytherin team gets here."

"Did I imply that I thought you were here bent on a
nefarious purpose?" Snape half-snapped, though his voice
held no rancor. He pulled his broomstick up close to Harry's
so that he could both face her and steady himself.
Their legs brushed at the knees.

Harry mused that it felt strange to feel warmth emanating from
her once-feared Potions master. She would have
reached down to rub the sensation of it deeper into her knee, but the
gesture seemed too intimate to perform in
front of Snape; although, of late, intimate gestures seemed more
interesting when coupled with thoughts of him.
Down girl! Harry thought, summoning the image of
Sirius' face contorted in rage in an effort to quiet the
thrumming of her blood.

Snape gave a sarcastic nod of acquiescence, and Harry noted
from his unusual proximity and quick glance down
at the field that he wasn't comfortable being so high off the
ground. It really was unusual to see the Potions
master flying.

"So, what may I do for you this morning?"
Harry asked.

I can think of several happy actions you might
perform for me, thought Severus, struggling not to allow his
desire to reach his eyes. It had been eight years since
sixteen-year-old Draco Malfoy's ill-advised, but
well-intentioned, wandless magic had both saved and changed Harry. In
that time, Hogwarts' current Defense
Against the Dark Arts instructor had grown into her lithe limbs and
developed an intriguing curve to her mouth
that Severus couldn't help but want to explore. That
would be . . . inappropriate, he thought, damning himself
for his perpetual feelings of disappointment.

"Professor?"

"While I am not used to playing the messenger, I am
doing so as a favor." He reached into his robes and drew
out a letter, handing it to Harry. "Minerva asked me to give
this to you when it came time for you to succeed
her."

Tentatively, Harry reached for the letter. "Why
didn't she give this to me herself?"

"Perhaps that is explained in her letter.
I'll leave you to your privacy."

"Professor Snape . . . Severus?" Harry
called.

Severus. "Yes, Harry?"
Snape asked smoothly, returning to her side, trying to ignore the
disconcerting way
Harry's voice made his name echo in his mind.

"Thank you for keeping this safe for me. And
please—call me Ree? You're the only one who
doesn't, you
know." While it was impossible not to think of herself as
"Harry," referring to her by the feminine form of
her
given name had helped most of her friends to accept the Change.

"Ree," he acknowledged, allowing the
diminutive name to roll across his tongue and into the air. It felt
good to
say it. It felt even better to be asked to say it.
"Congratulations, Ree. I know you'll make an
exemplary head of
house."

"Thank you, Severus. Of course, no one will ever
replace Minerva McGonagall."

"As, I am certain, no one will ever replace Ree
Potter," Snape said, inclining his head in a dignified salute
before gliding quickly off in the direction of the castle.

Harry knew that she'd never received higher praise
in all her life.

~*~

Professor McGonagall's letter was crisply written in
that lady's straightforward way:

"Dear Ree,

"It will come as no surprise to you, I trust, to
know that I have always felt towards you a motherly affection. You
were a good boy, and then a good girl, under the most trying of
circumstances. You have always made me
proud. I know that Lily, and James, too, would have been proud to see
into what a fine person you've grown. I
take a little selfish comfort in knowing that I had a hand in your
upbringing.

"As you take on new responsibilities at Hogwarts,
remember that a firm hand should always be a kind one;
consistency is a comfort to children and adults alike; the First Years
are not
growing smaller every year; and, as
I told you before you stepped into your first authorized
classroom, the children are more afraid of you than you
are of them.

"Do not worry so very much about how the other
teachers will view you now that you are a head of house.
Whether you know it or not, you have earned everyone's
respect. Should you ever feel the need of counsel,
however, consider taking tea with Severus. Over the years,
he's given me much about which to think—some of it
worthwhile.

"Before I end my letter, I must burden you with a
task. For years, I have been altering Albus' candy supply to
prevent the man from suffering the ill-effects of excessive sugar
intake. The spell you'll need to cast is
Zuccarum Innocuus. It does not interfere with the flavor of sweets,
despite what some may say.

"Please take care of Albus for me, dear; I know that
he'll be lonely, now.

"You, of course, need not be so. I think you know
what I mean. Be brave in every
area of your life, young lady. I
expect nothing less from you. Dating a glorified dragon-tamer, indeed!
Charlie Weasley is a fine boy, but he'll
never settle down properly,
you understand.

"With love, and the certainty that you will do what
is right,

"Minerva McGonagall"

Harry tucked the letter into her robes and began to cry.
Professor McGonagall had said everything to her that she
needed to hear, but, despite having had the courage to help vanquish
Voldemort and his Death Eaters, Harry
was yet afraid of many things.

Chapter Two: The Understanding of
Unintimidatables

Charlie Weasley stood in the Hogwart's entrance hall
looking like the favored younger son of a wizard king:
barely respectable and effortlessly dashing. His increasingly long,
thick red hair gleamed in a wave down his
back, cresting above buttocks that looked as though they could have
deflected flame. His boots, trousers, and
vaguely tailored jacket were of russet-colored dragon hide, and the
cotton shirt he wore boasted fine cuffs that
flowed over his hands to mid-knuckle. He was even, Snape noted with
grudging admiration, wearing a slightly
faded embroidered waistcoat of red and gold thread that only further
served to frame his strong form. I hate him,
Severus thought as he pinned a tight smile on his face and entered the
hall.

"Mr. Weasley," he acknowledged the younger
man.

"Professor Snape! It's good to see you,
sir," Charlie responded, extending his hand.

Gods help me, but he means it, thought
Severus, surprised by the genuine friendliness he saw in the
boy's face.
He took Charlie's hand. "I take it that you have
come to see Professor Potter on this most important of
occasions?"

"Yes, sir. It's not every day that Ree
gets to coach Gryffindor to victory over Slytherin!"

Snape opened his mouth to snap something withering, but then
closed it. The Slytherin team had yet to be
beaten this term.

"Just kidding, sir. I can't wait to see
our new Head take her position at the High Table for the first
time."

In truth, when a professor was elevated to the head of his or
her House, no great ceremony was made of it. The
Headmaster would make his or her announcement introducing the new head,
all would be seated, and life at
Hogwart's would continue as it always had. Of course, for the
professor who assumed the position of an absent
colleague, there was a certain level of regret and anxiety, which is
why friends and family were always invited.
And Charlie Weasley, Snape knew, was likely one day to be both to Harry.

An air of excitement emanated from the younger man, Snape
noticed, as they spoke of polite subjects to which
he paid just enough heed.

He is, of course, pleased to soon be seeing Harry
again—Ree.

Thinking of her name made him want to smile, though he dared
not do so. Severus found himself wondering
when was the last time he'd permitted an emotion to play over
his features in the frank open way of his former
student, and missed something Charlie was saying.

"Forgive me, Mr. Weasley. What did you
say?"

"I said," Charlie replied, flushing,
"that Mum insisted I come alone tonight. She thinks
it's high time that Ree
and I get used to events on our own, and—"

"Charlie!" a bright, almost imperceptibly
strained, voice rang through the hall. "You're
here!" Harry exclaimed,
rushing headlong into the man's now out-stretched arms.

Severus did not miss the redness of her eyes.

"Where else would I be?" he answered her,
bracing as the slightly taller girl made contact.
"I've missed you,
Seek," he replied.

"Missed you too, Snitch."

"Yes, well. I shall see you both this
evening," Snape said abruptly, striding from the hall before
either Charlie or
Harry could respond. You are an idiot, he told
himself, as he made his way back to his rooms to repine in
silence.

~*~

The Gryffindor-Slytherin scrimmage went better than expected,
considering that each team had recently lost a
player. After some tips from Harry to her team, which now included
Frazier's alternate, Humbug Forrester, as
Keeper, and a few words from Acting Coach Krum, the Flying instructor,
to his team—Argyle Slizer having
replaced Finch-Fletchley—the game had been rough but clean.
Tied three to three, the Slytherin Seeker had
caught the Snitch in a spectacular twisting dive, and both
teams had cheered the winning one.

Charlie had been taken aback by this reaction. Ree had told
him that, while the two teams remained competitive,
they were not hell-bent on killing each other anymore. This could have
been so because there were no longer
any children of Death Eaters among the players, but, Charlie thought as
he watched his girlfriend, it probably
had more to do with the fact that she seemed to take an honest interest
in the all the athletes. Indeed, as the day
wore on, it became clear to Charlie that Ree and the other professors
had done a great deal to foster goodwill
amongst the Houses.

In her afternoon Defense Against the Dark Arts class, for
example, Ree made a point of praising those students
who were performing a repulsion spell especially well, and turned the
classroom into a workshop with the more
advanced students teaching the ones in need of help. And, rather than
lord their prowess over the other students,
the Slytherin and Ravenclaw Fifth Years whom she'd asked to
lead the groups seemed genuinely interested in
helping the others to do well—most of
them, anyway. It was unlike any class Charlie had ever had.

"You love this place, don't
you?" he asked her after her last student filed out of the
sunlit classroom.

She is home, thoughtCharlie. How can I ask her to change her life?
But there was nothing for Charlie at
Hogwarts other than Ree, and he much preferred the heat and excitement
of the Carpathian mountains to the
civilized disorder of "home." It had, in fact, been
months since he'd seen his girlfriend. They had taken to
indulging in a vigorous owling habit to remain close to one another,
which left them free to immerse themselves
in their respective careers.

Harry watched the conflicting emotions work
Charlie's face, catching the surface thoughts of his mind
with
ease. She was sure now, in this quiet moment, what she had to do, even
if she did not know quite how to do it.

"Do you remember what you said to me after I
strained my hamstring when I was a Seventh year?" she asked
him.

"Yes, well, you know what they
say—'faint heart never won fair
maiden'."

"And you made short work of my maidenhead,
didn't you?"

"Short!"

"Stop it," Harry laughed, positioning
Charlie to rest between her legs. "You said,
'Harry, you're a girl now.
You've got to start reacting to men the way a girl should
because they definitely react to
you'."

"I was trying to teach you to protect yourself from
the everyday evil that men do, not
seduce you," Charlie
replied, laying light kisses in Ree's hair.

"You stick to that story. It puts you in a special
class of men."

"Oh?"

"Men who aren't intimidated by
me."

"Ree . . . ."

"It's all right, Charlie. I'm a
'special' case."

"I've always wondered if Draco did it on
purpose—"

"No, he didn't."

"How do you know?"

Harry sighed and leaned into Charlie's chest a
little more. She did not often dwell on that moment when, shortly
after arriving on Platform Nine and Three Quarters to await her sixth
train to Hogwarts, she found herself under
attack by Lucius Malfoy. She had not noticed the man until he was upon
her and they had disapparated to an
empty and unfamiliar field, and she had not noticed much after that
because then the kicks and the curses of the
many hooded figures had begun to fly. She did, however, remember
finding it strange to hear Draco's voice
raised in that clearing just before everything in her mind went blank.

She woke up, and that was the problem. For when she
had gone to sleep—been knocked into it, more like—she
had most certainly been a he.

"Why do I have breasts?" Harry
asked, stiffly trying to rise into a sitting position and trying to
think clearly.
Lucius Malfoy had just been beating her. Where did he go?
she thought, feeling in the damp earth in which
she'd awoken for her glasses.

Semi-hysterical laughter greeted her ears.

"Malfoy?"

More laughter, great, gulping gasps of air, and the
thud of a body falling near her were her only answers.

"Draco Malfoy, what the hell is wrong with
you?" Harry demanded, orienting herself to face the overcome
boy.
At least she could pretend that everything was
normal. As she shifted, and her balls did not, however, she began
to feel that perhaps panic might answer.
"Draco, are you . . . intact?"

"Oh,
Potter—Harry—Potter . . . I'm a good deal
more 'intact' than you are, mate—I mean,
ma'am—oh, by the
dark Gods . . . no," he spat, succumbing
to tears.

Harry reached a tentative hand out to Draco, which he
shrugged off. "No! Don't touch
me!"

"I'm sorry, but . . . but what
happened? Where's your father? Where are the others? WHERE
DID MY COCK
GO, DAMN YOU?"

"Right, that's
right—damn me. Oh, this is just perfect,
Potter—OWW!"

"Malfoy, tell me what your father did to me
now, or I'll—"

"You hit pretty well for a girl,"
Draco said, lapsing into hysterical laughter.

"AGH!" screamed Harry, as she
lunged at Draco, only to throw herself off of him in horror when, while
rolling
him on the ground and beating him, she felt his erection.

Draco stopped laughing. "Don't be
flattered, Potter. I'm in shock."

Harry pushed the memory aside and looked at Charlie again.
"Let's just say that Draco's interest in
me was
completely thwarted when I became a girl. I
wasn't his intention to change my sex, you know. He just
wanted to
save my life."

She decided not to notice that Charlie was asking about
Draco's motives, and focused on what his actions had
been that day. "I don't pretend
to understand any of it, really. . . . Somehow, the life charm that
Draco cast
interfered with his father's death curse, and Mom's
old protection turned my tail to sugar."

Charlie furrowed his brow.

"Muggles say that little boys are made up of
'sticks and snails and puppy dog tails' and that
little girls are
created from 'sugar and spice and everything
nice'."

Charlie furrowed his brow and tried to raise his left eyebrow.
Harry giggled.

"It doesn't really matter, anyway. Draco
was right."

"Draco was right about what?"

"After he left Hogwarts—in a
letter—he told me that, if I wanted to live, I could accept
my life without having a
reason for the Change."

"The Change matters enough to you that you almost
never leave Hogwarts. How is that . . . acceptance?" asked
Charlie gently. He'd never managed to get Ree to discuss this
particular subject before, and as it was most likely
his last opportunity to do so, he felt he might as well try again.

"I'm the
Boy-Who-Lived-To-Become-The-Girl-Who-Vanquished-He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named,
Charlie, and
that makes me more than just a passing object of curiosity."

"Yeah, people definitely react
to you."

They remained wrapped together and silent for a long moment.

"So, who else is on your list of
Unintimidatables?"

Chapter Three: Zuccarum Innocuus
and Something . . . Stronger

It was getting precariously close to dinner, and Harry was
pacing outside the entrance to Professor
Dumbledore's rooms, trying the name of every sweet she could
think of as a password. "Chocolate Frog . . .
Lemon Whistle-Stick . . . Crab-Apple Cream Puff—"

"Bran muffin," a strong voice said behind
her. The door opened, and the spiral stairs began moving upward.

"Bran muffin?" Harry asked, stepping onto
the stairs, too disturbed by the fiber of Dumbledore's
password to
worry about Snape interfering in her mission.

"It is not a good sign, I admit."

Harry had not seen the Headmaster for a few days, as
he'd gone to London to make some final arrangements
regarding Professor McGonagall's property there. It had been
seven months since she had died, and many years
too soon.

Without immediate healing, some spells lingered in the body
and caused it to waste, and Minerva had absorbed
too much dark magic over the course of the war. She was not the only
Order member to be lost in this way,
though it seemed the hardest one to bear. When Bellatrix Lestrange had
killed Ron five years previously with a
strangling spell—something he could have freed himself from
had he not also been occupied with maintaining a
protective ward around a pregnant witch and her other children, all of
whom he had saved—Harry had felt like a
limb had been rent from herself. But at least Ron had not suffered
prolongedly. In the days preceding Minerva's
death, Professor Dumbledore had been increasingly withdrawn and
uncommunicative, saving any cheer he
could muster for her alone, and knowing that there was nothing he could
do to ease her pain.

"I see that you've brought
Quann's Quad-Chocolate Bon Bons," Snape noted,
following Harry into the
antechamber of Dumbledore's office.

"I'm here to do a favor for
Minerva," she replied, walking through the open door that led
to strange objects,
Dumbledore's desk, and Fawkes. The phoenix, fully plumed, was
sleeping.

"I suspected as much."

"Why are you here?" Harry asked, looking
around the room.

"I . . ." he began, and then stopped. Why
am I here? Because I was coming to see if Albus had returned so that I
could talk about you . . . again. Because I thought you
might be here, as well. Because—"

"—You're doing it
again."

"Doing what?"

"Getting lost in your thoughts when you talk to me.
I must be terribly boring," she said, the right corner of her
mouth curving provocatively. Making a show of taking out her wand and
pointing it at a bowl of lemon drops,
she said, "Zuccarum Innocuus!"

"I could accuse you of being many things, Professor
Potter, but boring is not one of them," Snape offered silkily.

His response intrigued Harry.

"'Professor Potter'?"
she asked, cocking a quizzical eyebrow at Snape and stepping closer to
him.

He felt the challenge, and met it with a step of his own.
"I expect congratulations are in order?" he asked,
pleased that his voice remained neutral.

"Slytherin won today, not Gryffindor."

"I was referring to your impending nuptials to Mr.
Weasley. My students speak of nothing else."

Well, faint heart never won fearsome man.
"Why would my 'impending nuptials' cause
you to revert to a more
formal mode of behavior toward me, Severus?"
she asked, impulsively extending her arm to tap the tip of her
wand lightly against the other teacher's chest.

Insolence! Snape thought, his nostrils
flaring in nervous anger. What does the woman think
she's doing? "Accio
wand!" he barked, snatching that object from the air. That
will teach—"

Severus felt himself dragged inexorably toward Harry, pressed
up against her form, and compelled to gaze down
at her as she tantalizingly drew the palm of her left hand possessively
up the right side of his body, over his
shoulder, down his arm, and to his hand, removing her wand from his
increasingly senseless fingers. He knew
that he was shaking. He knew that he was aroused. He hoped that she
could not feel either condition. There was
a chaotic light dancing in her eyes, daring him to do . . . something,
but he was not sure if he would be able to
move if he tried, and he would not struggle.

In what he hoped was a dignified tone of polite disinterest,
he asked, "How is it that you haven't lost your
limbs,
yet?"

The dark fire in Harry's eyes visibly dimmed, but
she did not look away. Smiling ruefully, she said, "I
haven't
needed a wand since the day Voldemort died, Professor Snape. And
this," she explained, stepping back and
waving her right hand in an unenthusiastic flourish, "is
nothing but a parlor trick." She tucked her wand back
into her robes and turned on her heel.

Her spell released him when Harry crossed the threshold of the
room, and Severus staggered forward and
gripped Professor Dumbledore's desk to prevent himself from
falling.

"Yes, well, I thought there might be kissing,
you see, and I did not wish to . . . interrupt it," he
replied
unrepentantly, beginning to solidify in his chair.

Snape straightened up and glared down at the older wizard.

"All this skullduggery has made me rather hungry.
Let us repair to my sitting room where I've a supply of lemon
biscuits that may yet be untouched by the tender magic of good
witches."

"I trust you have something stronger than lemon
biscuits to offer me?"

"Indeed. Ree seems to have left me a box of
Quann's Quad-Chocolate Bon Bons."

Snape groaned, but followed the older man without further
complaint.

Chapter Four: Love, Death, and
Lemon Biscuits

When they were settled in the cozy little room, Albus
levitated a cup of tea to his guest, raised a lemon biscuit to
his lips, and paused before biting into it to ask, "So . . .
why wasn't there kissing,
Severus?"

The younger wizard inhaled sharply and placed his teacup on a
side table. Throwing his head back into the
cushion and exhaling, he allowed his long lean form to relax into the
upholstery while casually extracting his
wand from his robes and surreptitiously pointing it at Albus'
biscuit.

"Zuccarum Innocuus!"

Albus popped the biscuit into his mouth and allowed it to
dissolve on his tongue before he swallowed it, and
then sighed.

"That was unkind, and it will not prevent me from
having an answer to my question."

"This is an unacceptable conversation to be having
about . . . a stu—a colleague."

"I think that you were going to say
'student', weren't you? The fact that you
thought the better of it should tell
you something."

"Perhaps."

The older man sighed. "Do you know that it took me
fifteen years to work up the courage to speak to Merva of
my feelings for her?"

"That is very
different."

"How so?"

"Minerva was a grown woman when you met
her."

"Actually, she was a sleek little cat,"
Albus said, momentarily lost in a memory. "I stepped on her
tail . . . but
that is neither here nor there. To return to your situation, I do agree
that before you speak to Ree of your
feelings, you must contend with the differences between your individual
powers and . . . experiences."

"What do you mean by that?" Snape demanded
harshly.

Albus raised his eyebrow at Severus' tone,
considering carefully before he spoke. "Though lacking
finesse in
some areas of her life, Ree has experienced . . . much that you have
not."

Severus could hardly argue the point. There had been more
death than sex in his time with the Dark Lord, and
before that . . . . In spite of this, Severus had a strongly developed
sense of desire; he'd watched it demonstrated
by students, by colleagues, by those upon whom he spied, and, of
course, felt it within himself as a burning ache
that never cooled. He thought of the wanton flame of Harry's
eyes as she had held him pinned against herself.
He was not sure what sort of lust had generated it, but it was the same
fire that had wreathed her in power as she
stood before the hordes of their enemy at the end with nothing but a
phial and her wand as protection. She had
drunk from the phial, and then drawn her wand down over her forearms,
opening her veins. Her blood had
painted her dress as it plashed thickly into a living pool at her feet
and moved away from her in an undulating
circle.

"I am not afraid of her, Albus .
. ."

The Death Eaters had swarmed Harry, blocking her from his
sight, and he had felt desperately sick as Neville
Longbottom, Blaise Zabini, and others he did not know prevented him
from going to her aid. Why don't you let
me help her, damn you all? he had
screamed. And then he had heard Harry chant something in what he knew
must be a wizard tongue so arcane, so vile, that it would not have been
found described in a tome anywhere in
the Restricted Section.

". . . not intimidated by her knowledge, . .
."

He'd watched, horrified, as ropes of blood began
writhing out from under the circle of Death Eaters, winding
about their bodies, weaving through them. There had been a hissing on
the wind that he had barely been able to
recognize as Harry's voice. Parseltongue.
The blood energy coiled together into a massive, gyrating viper that
cast a shadow upon the sky, blotting out the moon over the Ministry of
Magic. It found Voldemort and struck
him down.

". . . nor jealous of her power."

The Dark Lord's skin had blackened and peeled back.
His body had seemed to bubble over as liquefying bones
and unrecognizable fluids. All the Death Eaters had died this way,
spilling themselves into a congealed mass of
viscera that strengthened the spell serpent, which turned on its caster
and thrust through Harry's body in a wave
of energy again and again and again. Listening helplessly as her
commands turned to screams, Severus knew
that the spell she was wielding was fueled by death, and that Harry
intended to seal it with her own.

"I do not pity her for her choices, . . ."

He had struggled against the Aurors so violently that he had
dislocated his shoulder, yet had been unable to
escape them. Then, as Voldemort had dissolved, and Harry had,
inexplicably, not, the shadow serpent dispersed
into suffocating clouds of undirected magic. Severus had dragged
himself to Harry and thrown his body over
hers in an attempt to shield her. Grasping her head in his begored
hands so that she would not crack it open upon
the pavement, he saw that she had bitten through her lips . . . with a
ragged set of newly presented fangs. It was
then that he understood the full extent of her actions: Harry had taken
his place.

". . . despite the fact that she takes too much upon
herself."

He knew that it must have been Harry who had sent the snakes
into his dungeons to steal his blood and weaken
him, that she must have been unaware of the curse upon it.

"She is incautious, unprepared, . . ."

It had been Hermione Granger, haruspex and medi-wizard, who
had deciphered a means of expelling the
noxious energy from all of them after examining the remains of the
Death Eaters, but Harry had lingered in a
coma for months. Remaining away from her by day as one loved-one after
another had the privilege of keeping
the vigil at her bedside, Snape had slunk in late during the nights to
pour down her throat every cleansing potion
it was within his power to concoct. Despite the fact that he eventually
cured her of the vampiric infection,
despite the fact that she was thriving and he was alive, Severus found
it impossible to discuss with her the sense
of impotence and rage he had felt during this period.

". . . without those closest to her, she'd
be dead."

It seemed petty and vindictive to be angry at Harry for taking
away his choice, no, his right, to die in that
spell,
but his anger lingered to flicker through his exacting emotional
control at unexpected moments. Dying with the
Dark Lord could have been a release from the cold years he envisioned
in his future. Dying in order to forever
seal Voldemort from this plane could have proved to his detractors that
he was worthy of their respect—and of
redemption. Harry's actions had been meant as a gift. But
Severus was unused to receiving gifts.

"It is difficult to know how to feel about what she
did."

The fact was that Harry Potter, the brightest star of the
Wizarding World, had attempted to give her life for the
pariah of its masses; she had literally attempted to eat his
death.

"And, in the end, I simply do not understand
her."

No one had ever done anything selfless for Severus before.
Albus' friendship was not to be taken for granted,
but what Harry had done . . . what Harry had done seemed almost
indecently intimate, and sometimes Severus
felt that he remained angry because Harry giving herself for him
had prevented him from giving himself for her.

And I do not know how else to show her that—"

"You love her," Albus said quietly.

Even the soft whispers from the portraits on the walls of the
room stilled at this pronouncement.

"Love is not for one such as I."

"Frog balls, my boy," asserted the older
man merrily, startling Severus out of his grim reverie. "Love
comes to
us as a gift, not a right," he continued, echoing the other
man's troubled thoughts. . . . "Perhaps it is time
for you
to ask Ree why she was prepared to die for you."

"I do not imagine I could bring myself to ask that
of the future Mrs. Charles Weasley, Albus."

"Ah. Well, that is for you to say."

"Albus, this conversation is moot. Charlie Weasley
got there before me."

"Did he?" Dumbledore asked, helping
himself to another lemon biscuit.

"Yes," Snape spat.

"Perhaps, but, as he engaged the Floo Network at
Rosmerta's not long after I arrived there this afternoon, I
expect he's not the rival you would have him be."

Severus' head snapped up as the irrational,
treacherous fingers of Hope seized him and the room seemed to
become too hot and too small. "Mr. Weasley was no doubt
called away on business," he said in an effort to
collect himself.

"No doubt. . . . Incidentally, I should tell you
that I'm taking the liberty of arranging a party to be held
after this
evening's meal."

"What is the occasion?"

"Charmed dessert—rather I should say, too
much dessert to charm," the Headmaster
answered, his eyes twinkling
mercilessly. "And I believe I shall require you to dance in
lieu of any retribution I might feel necessary to exact
for your interference with my lemon biscuits."

Snape straightened in his chair. "You cannot coerce
love into being where it does not exist, Albus."

"True. Yet one might urge it to feel comfortable
where it does."

Severus tried to glare, but he was too preoccupied to put the
necessary force behind it. He stood up.

"Try to wear something festive to dinner, old
friend."

As Snape strode off, he thought he heard a familiar voice
admonish, "Do stop eating those before you
ruin your
dinner." He was soon too far away from the sitting room to
hear Albus reply, "Yes, dear."

Chapter Five: Never Question a
Haruspex

Harry was in the Owlery, attaching a letter to
Hedwig's leg. She wanted Hermione.

"I'm such a coward," she said to
Hedwig, who hooted softly at her. "Why can't I face
this evening alone?"

For it seemed clear to her that Severus Snape was not
interested in her, and Charlie and she had said their
goodbyes earlier in the day. She did not regret having done so, but
that left the results of her inexcusable
behavior toward Professor Snape to deal with, and she was not certain
if she could face the Potions master
again. Sirius and Remus were staying away because of that
evening's full moon—their weak excuse for not
coming no doubt concocted for them by Molly Weasley—so she
hoped Hermione would be able to leave off her
research and join her. She decided to go back to her room and freshen
up before dinner.

Hermione was sitting on her bed when Harry reached her
chambers.

"How in Merlin's name did you do
that?" Harry asked.

"I'm a haruspex, remember?"

"You were reading entrails about me?"

"I've expanded the profession to include
other portents, Ree."

"Hermione. Whose entrails were
you examining?"

"The entrails of an unfortunate rat that young Percy
inadvertently disemboweled three weeks ago. It had died
of
natural causes, you know, but he wanted to bring it back to life.
I'm not sure what spell he attempted, but when I
found it split open and him crying his eyes out, there was enough left
of it to know you weren't going to become
Mrs. Charles Weasley—among other things."

Harry decided that the "other things"
could wait. Hermione had become a powerful 'fortune
lady', as her son
called her, and her auguries always
came to pass.

"Ron would have been proud of his son for trying to
save the poor creature," she offered.

"Yes, Ron would have been," Hermione
agreed briskly. "Fred and George, on the other hand, see it
as an
opportunity to cater to the two- to five-year-old demographic.
They've been attempting to develop an exploding
toffee rat ever since this happened."

Both women laughed. The joke shop run by the twins had been
amazingly successful, and they had regularly
sent Harry money to repay her "investment," as they
referred to the start-up funds she'd given them. She used
the money to support various causes, including Hagrid's rare
animal preserve he'd begun on the grounds of
Beauxbatons where his wife delighted in indulging his passion for
dangerous creatures. "'Eee vill 'ave
them,"
she would say, smiling adoringly at Hagrid.

Harry stood nervously before the doors to the Great Hall. She
was wearing a long flared dress of old gold velvet
that boasted a modest scooped neck. As she moved, the faintest shimmer
of green winked from the cloth. The
effect of the cut and fabric of the dress was to tastefully display
Harry's charms without offering an
inappropriate invitation to observers. The long
plait of hair that usually fell ignored and straight down her back
to brush her calves had been coiled up on her head like a crown. Using
magic, Hermione also had wound green
and scarlet ribbons through the braided circlet before arranging them
to fall as streamers over the remaining
loose tresses of Harry's burnished hair.

"Oughtn't you to be in the Hall
gettin' introduced instead of out here holdin' up
dinner?" Filch asked, walking
through the doors before Harry could respond.

Mrs. Norris trailed the caretaker without sparing a glance for
the young woman.

Harry stuck out her tongue at the "cat."
Mrs. Norris, who actually did sport one magical eye
in the back of her
head, made a rude gesture with her tail.

"Do you want the students to
starve?" Hermione asked, popping out the doors and favoring
Harry with an
expression of amused impatience.

Hermione spun in Peeves' direction and snarled,
"I will banish you if you even think
about interfering with Ree
this evening." Alarmed, the poltergeist sank through the
floor without another word. And the Bloody Baron,
who had been lurking nearby, glided past the young women to wink at
Hermione.

"Are you ever going to tell me how it is that you do
that?" Harry asked as she followed Hermione into dinner.

"No," her friend replied primly.

Chapter Six: All Good Wizarding
Families Do It

Viktor and Hermione looked companionable together as they
danced with the students in the Great Hall. The
tables had been pressed against the walls, and were laden with treats.
Albus sat quietly, surveyed the revelers,
and sipped his wine.

Harry had been asked to dance almost immediately by Gil
Gorechrist, a Seventh Year Slytherin of some not
inconsiderable self-importance; he had almost fallen over when she had
agreed. After that, it seemed that each
Seventh Year male of every house was determined to try for his chance
at a turn around the floor with Professor
Potter, and Severus was becoming annoyed.

"Ten points from
Gryffindor!" he announced sharply to Rhonda Freesia-Slaidon,
a Sixth Year currently hanging
on a female house mate in a most indecorous fashion. "And twenty
points from Slytherin," he thundered across
the floor to Miranda Frazier who was oblivious to the festivities as
Martin Finch-Fletchley traced a Bertie Bott's
Every-Flavor Bean over the blushing shell of her right ear.

Snape was seriously considering neutering Martin when he was
distracted by someone crying nearby, and a
small voice choking out, "That's all right,
Marazelle. There's plenty of better boys to dance
with." The small
voice belonged to Wenda Watlings, a Third Year, and the tears to
Marazelle Zabini, cousin of Blaise. Both girls
were in Slytherin. Snape turned abruptly to see a Hufflepuff Fourth
Year laughing as he walked away from the
girls. Well, Albus did tell me that I had
to dance, he thought.

"Now, now, Miss Zabini, it won't do to
favor the unworthy with the gift of your tears," he chided
gently, "not
when there are better boys with whom to
dance." He offered her his hand, which looked pearlescent
against the
blood red cuff of his evening shirt.

Wenda's mouth dropped open as her best friend
giggled and placed one delicate hand into Snape's. Marazelle
knew her Head of House personally, as his family and her own had
enjoyed a long association.

"But Professor," she said more calmly,
"I thought you only danced on holidays."

"And is this not a celebration, young lady? Do not
argue with me," Snape ordered, beginning to dance a
creditable waltz with his young charge.

Harry watched Severus' progress around the dance
floor with relief. If he's relaxed enough to dance,
perhaps
he'll be willing to speak to me,
she thought. She nudged Viktor, with whom she was now dancing, and
suggested he might wish to cut in on the Professor.

"Mees Zahbeeni, vould you allow me?"
Viktor asked, unable to look Snape in the eyes for fear that he would
burst out laughing. The poor man had no chance, not with Hermione, Ree,
and, he was almost positive, the
headmaster plotting against his uncoupled state. Viktor enjoyed his own
very much—though it had little to do
with the solitude he expected the Potions master to crave—and
of late he had been attempting to persuade
Hermione to enjoy hers.

"Ooo! I'd love to dance with you, Viktor
Krum," the now giddy Marazelle fairly yelled in the
direction of the
Hufflepuff boy who'd so recently slighted her.

It had the desired effect. Murphy Towson's friends
did not let him hear the end of being "passed over"
for
Coach Krum all night.

Harry laughed gently as the other couple danced away, turning
at last to look at Snape. "Professor, would you
care to finish this dance with me?" she asked, dropping her
eyes and blushing when he did not answer
immediately.

Severus found this most encouraging. "Accio Defense
Against the Dark Arts professor," he replied lightly,
quickly sweeping Ree into his arms and out amongst the throng of amazed
and parting students before either of
them could change their minds.

They did not dance the regulation twelve-inches apart, as the
conventions of both the waltz and most Hogwarts'
chaperones demanded.

Hermione, who was sitting with Professor Dumbledore watching
the dancers, turned to him, raised her glass,
and clinked it against the mug in his hand. "I give them a
few weeks to figure it all out," she said.

"I give them a few hours," he rejoined, a
gentle leer lighting his eyes.

Hermione blushed and took a long swallow of her wine.

"Albus, stop teasing Miss Granger!"
snapped a not-quite-amused voice from a rather crowded portrait just
above their heads.

"Yes, dear," that gentleman murmured,
sniggering drunkenly into his mug of butter beer.

Hermione, once more joined by Viktor, did not notice the
exchange.

Epilogue

The following day's detention for Martin
Finch-Fletchley found that young man nervously fingering the
ingredients for an anti-conception potion.

"But, Professor Snape, Sir,
I've never made such a complicated potion before. How can you
ask me to mix the
batch that will be used in the Infirmary?"

Severus grinned, and the shock of seeing that
gentleman's sharpish white teeth caused Martin to drop the
phials
he was holding. They shattered most satisfyingly on the stones at the
young man's feet.

"Five points from Slytherin for your clumsiness,
boy," Snape said crisply, levitating a small broom and
dustpan
from a cabinet to hang in the air in front of his student.
"You'll clean this mess without
magic."

Martin immediately began tidying his mess with a disconsolate
air. I'll never get this potion right.

"That is unfortunate, Mr. Finch-Fletchley, as Madame
Pomfrey has informed me that we are quite out of this

particular . . . necessity."

Martin, already pale at the thought of having to explain how
things stood to Miranda, experienced another pang
of dismay as he realized that the Professor really could
read his mind.

Severus settled down at his desk to pretend to read essays.
Rolling up his sleeves, he barely noticed when the
wretched Martin asked his permission to leave. It took a honeyed voice
pouring from the door to his classroom
to capture Severus' attention some hours later.

"Martin tells me that you have become . . . creative
in your punishments. Perhaps I should endeavor to
displease
you," Ree teased.

Removing a small blue phial from an unseen pocket in his robes
and holding it out to her, Severus smiled in
satisfaction. "That should keep Madame Pomfrey well-supplied,
I believe—unless you know of any reason why I
might need to lay in a larger supply of this particular
potion?" Merlin's beard! Did I just say
that aloud?

"Professor Snape! Is there something you forgot
to mention to me about the reproductive abilities of cursed
vampires during my recovery?" Ree asked in full flush and
mock horror.

Gods, so I did. Ignore it, Severus
thought, not knowing if he meant the injunction to apply to Ree,
himself, or
both of them. Somewhat abashed, he pressed on. "Did I lecture
you terribly after . . . ."

Ree leaned against the corner her former teacher's desk and
took the phial from his hand. "You did, but your
lectures have made me an expert on vampiric lore, cleansing potions,
ingredient knowledge, and enduring . . .
friendship, Severus."

"Ree," Severus said, extending his hand to
her again, "can it really be true that you count me amongst
your
friends?"

"I've long thought of you as a friend,
Severus," Ree answered, putting down the phial and taking his
hand into
both of hers. She lowered her eyes and with them traced the pale clean
path of his forearm, following her gaze
with a caressing hand.

At her touch, Severus lost his ability to breathe for a
moment, but he could hear Albus' voice saying, "Perhaps
it is time for you to ask Ree why she was prepared to die for
you."

Perhaps it was.

"Why did you do it?"

She understood immediately what it was he was really asking,
and that he had been able to ask gave her the
courage to answer. She drew in a breath as she raised her eyes to his.
"Because I couldn't bear the thought of
being responsible for the death of the first man—no,
the only man—I've ever truly loved."

Severus flung himself out of his chair and gathered Ree into
his arms. Mine, he thought, searching her eyes for
any sign of doubt.

"Yours," Ree assured him without
hesitation.

"Always," Severus choked out before tears
and kissing rendered further thought impossible.

Neither noticed the tiny crystal phial gently being pressed
against their faces, nor when the classroom door
swung quietly closed and clicked locked with a satisfied snap.

The phial disappeared into light blue robes as the Headmaster
slowly materialized outside of the Potions
classroom. I'd say that's definitely good
enough to be getting on with, Merva, Albus thought,
suppressing a
desire to whistle as he walked happily down the corridor and turned the
corner.

"Oh, Professor Dumbledore!" Martin
Finch-Fletchley exclaimed as he almost collided with the old wizard.
"Sorry, Sir, I was just going to see if I left my book bag in
Potions."

"Indeed?" Dumbledore asked, noting that
Martin had been headed into the dungeons from the
main part of the
castle. "Well, I would leave that until tomorrow. Professor
Snape is figuring out the connection between two
rather unique . . . ingredients in his laboratory just now. I am
certain he would prefer it if you did not disturb his
work."

Finch-Fletchley let out the breath he had been holding.
"Of course, Sir. I'll do that."

"Excellent, my boy. Excellent. Tell me, would you
care for a lemon drop? No, I expect not. You're a Bertie
Botts man, is that not so?"

Martin blushed as Dumbledore chuckled kindly.
"That's all right then, young man. A little
zuccarum never hurt
anyone."